If you have ever wondered what it would be like to see the St Petersburg Ballet perform one of the world's most famous ballets, then just imagine a night where you are amazed at how the human body can move in such way that it demonstrates the epitome of grace and strength all at once.
The dancers of the St Petersburg Ballet company make performing the difficult steps of ballet look easy as they gracefully glide across the stage, especially prima ballerina Irina Kolesnikova. Her performance of Odette/Odile was breathtakingly graceful and nicely complemented by Dmitri Akulinin, who played the role of Prince Siegfried.
From the first act, Erkin Rakhmatulaev was excellent as the Jester, as was being able to see the famous scene of the danse des petits cygnes – or dance of the cygnets as most would commonly know it – carried out on stage, which sees four dancers enter the stage in a line and move in unison en pointe as their arms are interlocked with each other. While the leads were brilliant in this performance, the ensemble cast was just as good; in the moments when the stage was covered with a flock of ballerinas in white dresses, just the sight and sound of them moving – much of the time in unison – across the stage was utterly impressive. As was much of the whole performance.
His Majesty's Theatre (finished).
